The specialty of Genetics is getting closer to being a reality. The Human Resources Commission of the National Health System gave the green light this Thursday to its creation, for which the Ministry of Health must now prepare the draft royal decree and thus begin its development. Minister Mónica García has celebrated the agreement “with all the autonomous communities” through her ‘X’ account. “We are advancing in the specialized and future-oriented approach to this group of diseases,” he published. However, as ABC has learned, at least two autonomies have abstained from the vote.
The ministry had already announced that it was working on the creation of this specialty, something that both professionals and patients had been demanding for years. The Secretary of State for Health, Javier Padilla, had recently announced that on the one hand the specialty of medical genetics and on the other hand that of laboratory genetics would be created, and this was agreed this Thursday in the plenary session of the Human Resources Commission.
Both professionals and patients had been denouncing for some time that Spain was at the bottom of Europe for being the only country that did not have this specialty, which especially had an impact on people who suffer from rare diseases, which take years to find a diagnosis due to the absence of these specialists. According to data from the Spanish Federation of Rare Diseases (Feder), on average patients wait around 6 years until they are diagnosed with a rare disease and in 21% of cases it takes 10 or more years.
The Platform for the creation of the multidisciplinary specialty of Clinical Genetics, made up of both professionals and patients, had taken the matter to Europe, since a few months ago it presented an arbitration appeal in the European Parliament in which it demanded the regulation of the specialty of genetics in our country.
A “historic achievement”
After learning of this Thursday’s decision, the Spanish Association of Human Genetics has celebrated the “historic achievement” it represents. It is “a critical turning point for the SNS because it will allow it to align with Europe and stop being the only European country without the recognition of specialization in genetics,” said the president of the association, Encarna Guillén, in a statement.
Guillén has also claimed that the royal decree should include a transitional provision that contemplates access to the specialty for professionals who can prove years of work in work related to this specialty. The association estimates that the training of new specialists could begin in 2026.
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